


Hero's Mirror

by InkedMyths



Category: The Legend of Zelda & Related Fandoms, The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild
Genre: AU of some sort, Shenanigans, The Chaos Verse, god i need to continue this, it has been MONTHS, more to be added - Freeform
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-07-22
Updated: 2019-07-22
Packaged: 2020-07-10 10:17:59
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,518
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19904122
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/InkedMyths/pseuds/InkedMyths
Summary: Each hero blessed with the spirit of Courage faces their own trials and adventures. They each face off against the demons of hared. And each, at some point, must come face to face with a demon that shares their face. Their Shadow. They will square off, and defeat their evil, proving themselves victorious.But what happens when one particular set just... decide not to?





	Hero's Mirror

**Author's Note:**

> Did a few edits from the original, seeing as the premise has changed overtime.

The title of Hero has been passed down for millennia in Hyrule. Stories upon myths upon legends speak of those brave enough to face evil head on. No adventure is exactly the same, but similarities thread through each tale of daring. Certain events, certain names… certain trials.

Among those trials is that of the Shadow. Each Hero, on his quest to prove himself, must face his Shadow in battle. Typically, this is involved in proving their worth in wielding a sacred item, most often the blade known as the Master Sword. The battle was to be a test of strength in the body and mind, as well as endurance, tactics, and overall skill. It often requires preparation, as it is no easy task to face one’s own darkness. Many took as long as they could to prepare for the showdown. It was an important marker on the journey of a Hero.

A marker of which Link knew nothing about.

That isn’t to say he wasn’t told. In fact, he’d known all about it at some point. He may have even completed said trial. But that was all a century prior to waking up with no memory. And, as it turned out, amnesia meant he had to go out and prove his worth again. Not that he minded too much, seeing as he didn’t remember doing it before anyway and wasn’t entirely sure himself if he qualified as ‘worthy’. In fact, Link thought it sounded like great fun to repeat his prior actions. Exploring and relearning the world was quite a good pastime, in his opinion. A legendary blade that wouldn’t break was certainly a plus as well. He was tired of those useless pieces of metal he picked up off of bokoblins. He’d finally been able to pull the blade out of the stone the princess had left it in.

Said blade gleamed in the setting sun, polished metal glinting elegantly. Even if he hadn’t known it was the Master Sword, he’d have guessed it was a powerful blade by looking at it. This was a far cry from the swords left by monsters and simple travelers. Aside from the excellent workmanship, the blade radiated a certain power. Sometimes, if he strained his ears, he thought he could here faint music coming from it.

Link whistled as he walked aimlessly. He had no idea what he was whistling or where he'd heard it, but it invoked images of a fresh, green forest. Since he was approaching one at that moment, he deemed it fitting. Maybe he picked it up from the koroks?

As he scanned the trees in front of him, he returned to turning over a thought he’d been coming back to since leaving the Lost Woods. He was fairly sure the Great Deku tree had mentioned 'trials of the Hero’ that he had to face. Link, being as unknowledgeble as he was, had no idea what those entailed. The Shrines, perhaps? Divine Beasts? Despite having pondered the statement repeatedly, he wasn’t all that worried. He was sure he’d figure it out one way or another, whether that being someone telling him or him stumbling across the answer on accident. It was usually the latter.

That train of thought was quickly derailed as his eyes locked on a structure past the trees. Link’s ears twitched slightly at the sight of the bokoblin camp. He couldn’t tell how many there were from here. At least five, possibly fifteen. Sitting down, he started shuffling through his gear. The sun dipped down behind the hills and darkness settled across Hyrule as Link dug around in his gear. This bag of holding was useful, but a bit of a pain to find stuff in.

It was at that moment that his sword began glowing.

The Master Sword, to be specific. Link looked over in surprise, a feeling which only increased as he glanced behind him to see his shadow cast by the glow… shifting? Which most certainly was Not A Thing Shadows Should Do. It wavered for a moment, as if being seen through water. Then it stopped. Then it did it again, before solidifying once more. It did this a few more times, then was still. It was still for one, two, three, five seconds...

And then it began moving on its own.

It shifted an arm, feeling its fingers as though testing them out. Link watched in fascination as it shifted its arms. Then it turned its head towards him, red orbs appearing where eyes would be. The shadow then seemed to bubble. Not as in it began shifting across the grass in a certain way, but as in an actual black substance bubbling on the ground where the shadow was. It pulsated upwards, oozing and popping as it began to take shape. It shifted and grew and writhed until it formed a vaguely humanoid shape that was getting less vague by the second. One twisting dribble became an arm. Another swirled into what looked like fabric. After a continuing shifting and formation, Link was, to say the least, rather surprised.

Standing in front of him was his Shadow. It looked exactly like him, apart from the fact that it was mostly black and dark grey with white hair and pure red eyes. But definitely him. He tried to think of something to say, since it- he?- seemed to be waiting for him to do something.

* * *

“…oh.”

That wasn’t the reaction he was expecting. No no, he was pretty sure that wasn’t right. Wasn’t he supposed to look horrified or something? At least battle ready. But instead the Hero looked at him with a look of surprise. Not even shock, no, just surprise. Which he thought was rather rude. After all, he was the incarnation of his darkness. He was way more properly aghast last time- Hang on. Why was there a last time? He was pretty sure there wasn’t supposed to be. Now that he thought more on it, he’d definitely done this before. Which... shouldn't happen? Wasn't he only supposed to appear once? So why was he back here? And why was his memory so foggy?

He settled on fixating the boy with a glare for now. Only one way to find out. “Well?”

Said boy blinked, looking mildly confused. “Well what?”

Apparently his Cold-and-Intimidating voice hadn’t worked. “Well? What are you doing on the ground?” He hissed.

* * *

Link blinked again at his Shadow’s question. He supposed it was a fair inquiry. What was he doing here again? Then he remembered. “Oh yeah, the bokoblins.” He went back to rummaging in his bag, pulling out the last few things he’d been looking for. As he did so, he pondered the Shadow’s presence. Hadn’t someone at some point said the Master Sword would guide him? It had started glowing when the Shadow appeared. Maybe this was its way of providing guidance. A bit unconventional, he supposed, but then again so was just about everything else he did. At least he thought it was unconventional. To be fair, he wasn’t a hundred percent sure he knew what 'conventional’ was. For all he knew this was the norm.

* * *

He had definitely not been expecting that response. “Bokoblins?” He asked, slightly incredulous. What did that have to do with the fact that they were supposed to fight? Which was something he was pretty sure they had to do. But hadn’t they already done that?

“I’m getting there,” the Hero replied absently. He pulled out a bow and arrow before setting them aside and started pulling off his tunic.

“Why are you taking your clothes off?” He was more confused than ever. He was fairly sure the Hero had not been like this before. More like a typical hero. And had definitely kept his clothes on.

“It’s better.” The boy stuffed his clothes into his Convenient Magic Bag.

“…better?” It couldn’t possibly be better for a fight, so he hadn’t the foggiest as to what he was going on about.

“For fire.” A fire arrow was gestured to for emphasis. …okay then.

“And what is the fire for, exactly?”

“The bokoblins.” With that, he stood up, bow and arrows in hand and sword slung on his back and set off down the grassy slope towards the trees.

With lack of a better thing to do, along with being frankly quite stunned at the entire exchange, he followed the Hero down into the forest. The Hero, whom he noted, had both changed and not changed. He didn’t look like he’d aged much since the initial first time they'd met (that _had_ happened, right?). On the other hand, he was significantly more scarred. His entire left side was one giant scar, which was currently on display seeing as he wasn’t wearing anything save for his undershorts. It looked as though they were burn marks, so severe that he had to question how this here Hero was alive.

How being set aside, the very much alive Hero crouched behind a tree, ears perked attentively as he examined the encampment of monsters in front of him. Peering around the him, he could see that it was quite large, a several story structure wrapped around a tree. Several bokoblins wandered about the levels, as well as a few moblins.

He glanced to the Hero. “What exactly are you going to do about this?”

The Hero was silent as he took aim. “This,” he said as he fired the now ablaze fire arrow into the encampment. It hit a bokogoblin, who promptly burst into flame. Screaming, it ran into another one of its brethren, who in turn now had flames coursing across its body. This domino reaction continued until one of them flailed straight into a red barrel, which promptly exploded. The resulting fire ball set off other barrels, flinging monsters and turning the camp and the surrounding trees into a blazing furnace.

To his shock, the Hero was grinning. “Now that’s how you do it.” His eyes sparkled in the light of his bonfire, giving him an almost manic look.

He decided he actually quite liked this Hero.

Glancing up at the blaze, he spotted movement. “Looks like some of them survived.”

“Damn, that usually does the trick. Guess they want more fire.” He started to reach for another arrow.

“… Do you have any wooden weapons, perchance?”

The Hero paused, then grinned wider. “I like the way you think.” He reached into his bag and pulled out some kind of club. Standing up, he made note of the monsters still standing. “Alright, here goes nothing.” And he charged forward. One swipe of the club lit it ablaze. Nimbly dodging flames and various items scattered by the blasts, he smacked the first bokoblin he ran into, which died immediately. He continued across the clearing, his now aflame club making short work of the leftover enemies. Laughter could be heard among the squeals and crackling flames. It belonged to both the Hero and the Shadow, both seemed delighted but this absolute chaos.

Yes, he decided, he did rather like this Hero.

* * *

Link finished off the last moblin before turning to face his Shadow. He was still sitting at the edge of the clearing still, laughing. Grinning, Link made his way over. “Now that was what I call a good way to spend the evening.”

The Shadow chuckled more at that. “One hell of a way. Fantastic. Absolutely amazing.”

Link laughed with him a moment, before another thought occurred to him. “Say, who are you anyway? I mean, I kind of assumed you’re… I dunno, my shadow or something?”

His “shadow’s” laughter subsided. “That’s about right. I’m supposed to be a trial of some sort.” He paused, as though mildly confused, then glanced up to see his reaction.

Link considered this. “Like, a battle trial or something?”

“Essentially. I vaguely recall meeting before though, so I’m not sure entirely what this all means. It’s supposed to be a onetime thing.”

“I’m redoing everything, so I guess that makes sense. I probably did fight you or something previously, in that case.”

His shadow raised an eyebrow. “Why, pray tell, are you redoing everything.”

Link shrugged. “I was in a coma for a century and lost my memory, so I guess that made my worthiness questionable.”

“Alright, next question. Century long coma?”

“Calamity Ganon.”

“Ah,” he replied, seeming to understand, at least somewhat.

“By the way, are you… like, made of Calamity?”

The question was met with an offended pout. “Wow, rude. No I am not one of that pig’s henchman. Darkness, yes, but a different kind entirely. Better, more refined than that rubbish.”

“Okay then.” Link hesitated, shifting awkwardly. “So, do we, uh… fight each other then?”

“In theory. I don’t really feel like it though.”

“You don’t?” Link asked, surprised.

“You kidding? You just set an encampment of monsters and the surrounding area on fire.” He stood up. “Sticking around with you sounds far more entertaining than fighting.”

Link processed this for a moment. “So… you’d rather just, like, hang around than fight me?”

His Shadow rolled his eyes. “That’s what I just said.”

Link’s ears perked up slightly. A traveling companion! A very strange one, but still. “One more thing. Do you have a name? Since you can’t just have mine, and I’ve kind of just been thinking of you as the ‘shadow’ up until this point.” He waited while his question was considered.

“I haven’t thought of that. I guess we can’t both be Link, that would get confusing. Shadow is too basic,” he decided.

“Okay… what about… Night? Darkness? Shade?”

“Nope, still too basic.”

“Nocturnal?”

“Better, but I don’t like how it rolls of the tongue. Got any more interesting ones?”

Link bit his lip in thought. “…Caliginosity.”

“…What in fuck all does that even mean?”

“Misty or dark, I think.”

His shadow gave him a look. “You can’t remember doing the Hero Trials, but you remember some obscure word?” Link only shrugged in response. “Whatever. Why don’t we move away from darkness related words? Got any other ideas?”

“Uh… Chain? Like, Link and Chain?”

“Nope.”

“Drake? Dirk?”

“No and no.”

“…Gloopy.”

“If you call me that again I’m going to change my mind about fighting you.”

This went on for several minutes before the shadow was suddenly struck by an idea. “Say, what’s your heroic title? What are you the Hero of?”

Taken aback, Link answered. “Hero of the Wild, I think.”

“’Wild’ as in nature or as in crazy?” Once again, only a shrug in response. “Okay, wild, wild… something related to that.”

“How about Feral?”

His shadow blinked, then broke into a smile. “Feral. Feral. Yes, that has a nice ring to it. I’ll keep it.”

“Finally,” Link sighed.

They stood there for a moment. The fire had mostly gone out by now, though there were plenty of embers still glowing. Smoke curled around the remnants of what had been the encampment structure. Ashes swirled on the night wind. Link turned again to Feral. “Want to go find another encampment to burn?”

“Hell yes.”

**Author's Note:**

> And we're off!


End file.
